bones flooding with tremors/trying to understand how I put words to what whirls inside my prior days/impact of its trauma painting itself on the canvas of my voice… beginning appears the voice pitch changes, then appears the breathing difficulties upon speaking, then the episodes of stuttering, then the episodes of mutism, then the five years of complete mutism
 

abuse from multiple individuals
 

fearing if I pencil in its details, the true spirit of my being will not be sentient to those that read
those words/that my words may tiptoe as inflammatory or declarations too severe for one to embrace the permanent wounds of my soul
 
my core sensing the unwritten/sparing events by my inability to etch out every year of abuse 
may cause more suffering/that I will be having to choose which traumas scalpel my soul further than others to warrant a whisper into written word… rendering the others of their silence… as if others do not chip my soul enough to leave a lasting trace
 
my core sensing the written/breathing the words of my suffering could stitch a haunting lack of compassion towards the individuals and an all-consuming hunt for justice that may never be enough… drifting away from my heart's desire to spread compassion for all
 
my heart singingː
 
we are all interbeings, born to each other, without borders, belonging to nature and all beings/if I lose compassion for the individuals, I fear I will lose compassion and hope for all beings and lose

the desire to see another sunrise/I write this as an interbeing tethering in sorrow to those individuals while tethering in rapture to the beautiful lives I will never know
 
my soul exclaimingː
 
if our hearts sear open through unrelenting trauma, we cannot help but feel a profound need to 
ease the suffering of all beings/we cannot help but go beyond the fabric of our own
circumstances of pain… even as we are at present bleeding to survive and exist
 
my mind pleadingː
 
how can we transform a society to wipe away the tears of this planetary oppression of abuse for Earth and her inhabitants/how can we see our own hearts in one another/how can we recognize our own hearts in every person, in every being, in every form of life so that we may treat each
existence that houses our delicate hearts with love and compassion 
             
my dream bellowingː
 
liberate… please
 

my poem once whisperingː
 
a pencil speaks for me…

some dull, others sharp
weaving between cursive and print
 
a computer speaks for me…

characters of a keyboard

typing each letter
 
a hand speaks for me…

left palm in the air

fingerspelling ASL

 

a phone speaks for me…

texts of short sentences

reaching a distant friend

 

a smile speaks for me…
face with an expression 
hoping to lift a teary stranger